I also have friends who've gotten sick and suffered impaired health. Figure the 80/20 rule. 80 people suffer impaired health for every 20 that die. We're talking about 1 in 50 having damaged health.
Here are some epidemiologists arguing that: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/01/opinion/sunday/coronaviru...
538 made a model to play with: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/without-a-vaccine-herd-...
So, the plan may be wrong. Proponents may have sincere but incorrect beliefs.
There is also the problem that as a virus takes years to burn through clusters of susceptible people. Currently it would take over a 100 years to achieve herd immunity in California.
(As I understand it, the UK government's original plans couldn't have lead to herd immunity in the first wave without this, since they were planning on substantial measures to reduce spread even under those plans.)
For what it's worth there are less drastic options. Kingston, Ontario for instance was able to avoid having even a single infection within a nursing home. [1]
[1] https://www.theglobeandmail.com/canada/article-with-an-early...
They have families, children, partners. You think they'll give up 12 weeks of their lives locked in with their wards?
You really sound like a dangerous idiot, glad you're not in power.
Seriously? Cost is now the factor? I think we can find it in our 3 trillion dollar stimulus budget.
> They have families, children, partners. You think they'll give up 12 weeks of their lives locked in with their wards?
Is this a pandemic or is this stay and home tea party time?
> You really sound like a dangerous idiot, glad you're not in power.
Thanks man, regardless of whether you agree with me or not, I'd point you at the HN post guidelines.
It's literally how vaccines work. The proposal (again, without opining on its validity) is the same as vaccination, but comes with much greater risk.
EDIT: I misunderstood GP's point. I'll still leave my reply as-is since i still think the general idea I was trying to convey is sound.
That heterogeneity also goes the good way though, since people in jobs most prone to spreading the virus (doctors, nurses, store clerks, etc.) tend to get infected first and therefore become immune first. There are models suggesting we might reach overall herd immunity with only ~30% infected (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23149725), though this is obviously speculative.
Think of Ebola and herd immunity for more that a second, and you'll understand what it means: herd immunity is not the only way. Korea proves it too. SARS 2003 died without herd immunity either. What about HIV? Fancy trying herd immunity?
Herd immunity shouldn't be a goal.
Herd immunity is how vaccines work. It's the reason not everyone needs to get the measles vaccine so long as most people do.
> Think of Ebola and herd immunity for more that a second, and you'll understand what it means: herd immunity is not the only way. Korea proves it too. SARS 2003 died without herd immunity either. What about HIV? Fancy trying herd immunity?
If you can obtain a slice of the population that is not particularly strongly affected by a disease large enough to achieve the same result as you would with a vaccine, it's an avenue. That's true of folks under 45, broadly speaking. You may not like it -- I may not like it -- but it is an effective avenue.
It is the goal. This conversation is about different ways to achieve that goal.
And that is the crux of it. Can you avoid it? If you can avoid it, by all means do it. If you can't you might as well make sure you reach herd immunity by infecting the least susceptible age groups.
The ability of the population to stay indoors is limited, _especially_ if they don't see the effects of the disease (because they are indoors, right?) so you can't be able to keep up the pace for 2 years.
This is basically a bet on whether the resolution will be reached through herd immunity or some other means, some drug or quick vaccine.
If you do get the resolution by herd immunity anyway, you want to infect the least susceptible population and sustain the highest economic activity and standard of life for the population. If this bet pays off, you're least affected. If it doesn't and some magic solution shows up, you will have already bore the brunt of your approach and more people will have died than they should have.
If you get some sort of technical, quicker solution to the problem, the you will have the least overall number of deaths and will have paid a comparatively small cost by doing a lock down for a couple of months only. If this doesn't pan out and you get my herd immunity anyway, your overall number of victims will be higher than the herd immunity folks because statistically the spread will be uniform through age groups and your economy will be in worse shape because more people had to stay at home for a longer time.
It's all in what you think is the most likely resolution to the crisis and how well you follow through with your plan. I am though of the opinion that if you're to commit to a strategy, commit to it fully.